Review Blog

Aug 10 2011

The friendship matchmaker by Randa Abdel-Fatah

Omnibus, 2011. ISBN 978 1 862919204.
(Ages 10+) Recommended. Humour . Making friends at a new school can
be the most daunting of tasks, but not so when Lara Zany, Potts
Court Primary School's official Friendship Matchmaker is on the job.
This self appointed whizz at keeping people paired is a full time
task, so much so that she is even writing a manual about it,
containing all of her tried and true rules for making and keeping a
friend.
This very funny story about Lara and her exploits will have primary
kids laughing out loud as they recognise situations and characters
at their schools.
Lara is implacable, smoothly circumventing any situation in which
younger children are put at risk of being alone, or where girls may
be breaking one of the rules by wearing the wrong colour or saying
the wrong thing or, gasp, reading a book alone at play time. Lara
sees all and steps in, making sure that the students at her school
are befriended. She of course, needs no-one, as her role in life is
clearly laid out for her. But when a new girl, Emily Wong comes to
school, Lara is appalled. She does all the wrong things, wears nail
polish, eats leftovers for lunch, reads alone, doesn't follow the
behaviour of the other girls, and worst of all, makes friends
without Lara's being needed as an intermediary. The two must come to
blows sometime soon, and following the tale of these two will keep
the readers guessing about where the author is leading them. A
wholly satisfying story about friendship and being yourself, The friendship matchmaker will gain a huge following of
readers, while at the same time, making some apposite comments about
bullying, friendship and life at school.
Fran Knight